In the past four months, hundreds of farmers in Karnataka, ironically
the hub of GM industry, have taken their lives to escape the pangs of hunger and the
growing humiliation that comes along with crop failures. Unable to understand the ground
realities, the Karnataka government has been thinking of sending psychiatrists to talk
to farmers. Andhra Pradesh too had followed this misplaced vision.

At the same time, in the past few months - and for that matter a trend
that
continues from a couple of years - a few educated entrepreneurs in the
Karnataka's capital, Bangalore, have suddenly become the darling of the
state exchequer. Many foreign companies, most of them unable to operate in
the hostile environment against GM crops in the west, have moved shop to
Bangalore. Invariably, they all come with the promise of higher crop
yields, nutritional crops, and with the underlying thrust on eradicating
hunger.

It isn't therefore surprising to see Bangalore hosting five-star conclaves
every month or so in the name of fighting hunger. None of the
delegates, and I repeat, none of them have ever stepped out of the hotels to
even visit and meet the families of those who laid down their lives
essentially to sustain flawed policies, including the misplaced emphasis on
crop biotechnology.

The biotech epidemic has now spread wide. Karnataka is not the only state to
have doled out state largesse to a handful of industrialists and business
houses. If the recent surveys and reports in BioSpectrum are any indication,
many other state governments are queuing up with red carpets. Isn't it
surprising that the same politicians who were once despised by the
industrialists have now become their comrades in arms? Isn't it surprising
that the same elite class that once blamed the
'politician-engineer-contractor' nexus for siphoning off the state funds, is
now merrily part of the new age trio that comprises the
'politician-industry-scientist'?

Industrialists are not alone. Let us examine the dubious role of
agricultural scientists, part of the new age tribe. "When was the last time
you had organised a national conference on farmers suicides?" I asked a
group of distinguished agricultural scientists participating in a recent
national seminar on the need for a strong regulatory mechanism for GM crops
at the Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi. "When was the last
time you had organized a meeting on the shameful paradox of plenty that
continues to plague the country - millions living in abject hunger while the
mountains of foodgrains rot in the open?"

The resulting silence was deafening.

In 2002-03, nearly 17 million tonnes from the unmanageable food surplus has
been diverted for exports, and that too at a price that was actually meant
for people living below the poverty line. Another six million tones were
released for the trade at the same price. A year back, the country had a
staggering food surplus of 62 million tones, stacked in the open and facing
the vagaries of the weather. A report of the Standing Committee of
Parliament had estimated that the government was spending Rs 62,000 million
every year to maintain these food stocks. If every bag of grain in the
godowns was to be put in a row, it would stretch to the moon and back.

Agricultural scientists have refrained from debating this criminal apathy. GM
industry too has very conveniently ducked this uncomfortable question. Both
have instead joined hands to pry open whatever little that remains of the
state exchequer. Aided and abetted by the US Agency for International
Development (USAID), the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and
Industry (FICCI), and the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), continue
to organize seminars/workshops/conferences in league with the National
Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Indian Council of Agricultural Research
and the Tata Energy Research Institute on topics like the role of
biotechnology in fighting hunger.

If hunger at the time of plenty is a crime, if fighting hunger was a
national priority, would not a more humanitarian task be addressed by coming
out with recommendations on how to utilize the rotting food surpluses, on
how to make the surplus food stocks reach those who need it most, on how to
ensure that every citizen in the country is well fed? Shouldn't the
politician-industry-scientist trio impress upon the government the folly of
spending Rs 62,000 million in storing the grains and not spending the same
amount on its distribution? Couldn't the industry come forward to help the
nation fight the scourge? After all, there is no shortage of
food.

The hype that is being created through the gullible media is based more or
less on lies. The EU Environment Commisioner said "[GM crops] will solve starvation among shareholders, but not the
developing world unfortunately."

No GM please, we're British

Precious resources are instead being diverted from poverty and hunger
eradication to laying out an adequate regulatory mechanism (even if it is
only on paper) so to welcome the genetic engineering industry from the
United States and Europe - an industry, which is actually on the run. State
governments are making available prime land, massive resources and
tax-holidays, hoping that the sunrise industry will come to its rescue at
the time of general elections. Agricultural scientists, knowing that the
state has no money to even pay the monthly salaries, have found an alternate
job opening to sustain their own livelihood.

In the last few months, Monsanto, the torch bearer of the GM industry, has
pulled out of Europe; cut up to 9 per cent of its global workforce, reported
a $188 million loss; paid hundreds of millions of dollars in compensation to 20,000
residents
of Anniston, Alabama; seen a big drop in share value and now pulled out of
Pharmaceutical Crops. In Britain, in what is seen as a major blow to the
industry, Bayer Crop Sciences, a key GM crop developer, has decided to halt
trials of genetically modified plants. Bayer was the last company carrying
out GM trials in the UK.

In recent months, more than 20,000 people in Britain had turned out in
meetings and 37,000 people had filled in questionnaires in response to a
nation wide debate, aptly called "GM Nation?" In an overwhelmingly clear
verdict, 98 per cent of them rejected the introduction of GM crops, a
majority of them were in fact hostile to the idea. In New Zealand, some
9,000 protestors had marched through the streets of Auckland - some call it
the biggest demonstration since the Vietnam war - to show the government the
groundswell of public opinion against GM crops. Far away in Brazil, the state
of
Parana, which declared itself a transgenics-free territory, has held some
800 trucks - some of them from Paraguay - carrying genetically modified soy.

The biggest-ever scientific research trials, and that too carried by the
British government science agencies, have established what was widely known
and feared: GM crops do an irreparable damage to wildlife and biodiversity.
Cross-pollination between GM plants and their wild relatives is inevitable
and could create hybrid superweeds resistant to the most powerful
herbicides. The results of the research trials, which too were rigged, were
so obvious that scientists were actually unable to hide them any longer. Why
I say rigged, is because it subsequently became known that researchers
had used a highly toxic chemical on the non-GM maize crop, while the GM crop
was treated just once with another chemical, so allowing weeds and insects
to thrive.

And two years later, after the controversy shrouding the contamination of
maize - one of the world's most important food crops -- in its centre of
origin in Mexico broke, the Mexican government (and also the scientific
community) have now acknowledged that Mexico's traditional maize crop is
contaminated with DNA from GM maize despite a government prohibition on the
planting of GM seeds. The contamination is more widespread than what was
earlier reported. Isn't it therefore worrying that despite the known facts,
the Department of Biotechnology has given a green signal for research on GM
corn in India?

The hype that is being created through the gullible media is based more or
less on lies. The Independent, London (Oct 12, 2003) screams: "Ministers
knew of the environmental dangers, but the tests were designed not to focus
on this." Wasn't the same prescription followed for the tests on Bt cotton
in India? And as European Union Environment Commissioner, Margot Wallstrom,
said: "They tried to lie to people, they tried to force it upon people ...So
I hope they have definitely learned a lesson from it and especially when
they now try to argue that this will try to solve the problems of starvation
in the world. It will solve starvation among shareholders, but not the
developing world unfortunately."

In India too, spearheaded by the Department of Biotechnology, a massive
disinformation campaign has been launched. The reason is simple: stakes are
so high that if India rejects the faulty technology there will be no safe
haven for the discredited industry. And India, which has traditionally
accepted, and that too with a lot of respect, almost all kinds of rubbish
from the western countries - be it cow dung, toxic wastes, obsolete
industrial technology, sub-standard automobiles, cattle feed in the name of
food commodities, no eyebrows are raised in accepting an unwanted
technology, which comes with the more acceptable and emotional tag of
removing hunger.

In reality, neither the politicians, nor the industry and not even the
agricultural scientists are actually interested anymore in fighting hunger.
Under such circumstances, more and more state governments will follow the
trend initiated by Andhra Pradesh -- build up a cadre of psychiatrists to
advise farmers not to commit suicide.

Devinder Sharma01 December 2003

Devinder Sharma is a food and trade policy analyst. He also chairs the New Delhi-based Forum for Biotechnology & Food Security. Among his recent works include two books GATT to WTO: Seeds of Despair and In the Famine Trap.